


Copperplate

by tyrsdayschild



Category: X-Men - All Media Types
Genre: A+ communication skills, Character Study, M/M, epistolary (kinda)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-16
Updated: 2021-01-16
Packaged: 2021-03-14 00:40:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,724
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28787337
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tyrsdayschild/pseuds/tyrsdayschild
Summary: Prompt from Obe!For over ten years now, someone has been leaving Scott letters.
Relationships: Logan (X-Men)/Scott Summers
Comments: 5
Kudos: 34





	Copperplate

**Author's Note:**

  * For [OberonsEarring](https://archiveofourown.org/users/OberonsEarring/gifts).



Another note had appeared in Scott’s locker, he saw. He unfolded it- a small torn-off scrap of paper this time.

“Keep your chin up” the note said. As usual, it was unsigned.

Scott had been getting the messages for years now- practically since the team reformed. The only clue was the beautiful handwriting, a fluid cursive so elegant it was almost illegible. It was the sort of writing Scott only saw on greeting cards and fancy invitations, old fashioned and swirling.

The notes had started out as sort of bland encouragements, not unlike the one he had gotten today. “You’re doing fine,” “Don’t beat yourself up,” that sort of thing, after missions had gone sideways. They had started to drift into the almost funny- “I’m begging you to eat something other than soup, that can’t be good for your gut”, “Do you think if Kitty kissed Piotr in the cold she’d get stuck?” The notes were often slipped into his locker, but sometimes hidden in his things- he’d once found one tucked into a rolled up pair of socks.

Scott returned to his room in the mansion, pulled out an old shoe box from under his bed, and tucked the note inside. Most of the notes he had saved seemed slightly pathetic to hold onto, as if he was needy for even little drips of encouragement- but dominating the shoebox was The Letter.

The Letter was the only note Scott had received when he left the Mansion, addressed to him when he had gone to Alaska. It was a lengthy, rambling missive, over seven pages in length, the script scrawling in places. It had probably been written over several weeks, starting out with brief accounts of the happenings around the manor (“Kitty has discovered disco, God help us”) and accounts of missions (“No injuries, you’d be proud”) to surprisingly heartfelt observations of the affect his absence had on the team (“It’s not the same without you- I miss your keen eyes and level head”). It exhorted him with earnest, oddly old-fashioned marital advice (“A wife is a man’s most sacred deposit, devote every energy and every care to her perfect preservation”- the word’s stuck in his memory, stabbing him with guilt) and continued on, describing dreams and aspirations and hope that the writer evidently did not hold for themselves, swinging between urging him on to happiness and thinly veiled desire for Scott to come home (“I miss you, I miss you, and I can’t stand it, so stay away or I’ll never get over it”).

Scott wasn’t sure if these were love letters- they never praised his looks, never really told the authors own feelings- but he felt loved. The weight of that attention- almost constant, a note every few weeks for over ten years now- it grounded him. Whoever wrote these thought about him, held him in mind, wanted to share things with him they couldn’t seem to say out loud.

Scott might’ve suspected Kitty- she certainly had a flair for the dramatic and a skill for sneaking- but the letters had begun almost three years before she joined the team. He had thought Ororo- he had seen her handwriting before, which was rather similar- but she had never been shy about expressing her opinions directly. The only other person he could think of was Kurt- the timeline just about fit, he was sneaky and effusive and sometimes shy- but his hands… it was awful to admit, but there was no way Kurt could hold a pen well enough to write in cursive.

He tucked the box back under his bed, and laid down. Scott had never been very good with words- he thought, quite a lot, and sometimes it came out of his mouth with an eloquence that surprised him- but he’d never been very good at expressing himself in writing, even before his head injury. Now constructing sentences was laborious, one word after another, like building a wall. What would he even say? “Thank you for your weird little quips, thank you for your rambling thoughts, thank you for thinking of me all this time?” It all felt mortifying and utterly inadequate.

He rolled over, pulled out his pen and datebook from his nightstand- ripped a page from the month he’d most recently been concussed, he certainly didn’t need it. Scott hesitated, uncertain what to do.

He sketched, two birds in flight. He folded the paper in half, decisively, and wrote “To You” on the front. He made his manuscript as neat as possible, but it felt plain compared with to the note-writer’s handwriting. The next time they had a mission, after suiting up, he tucked the note into the seams of the locker, leaving it hanging out a little. Scott was pleased to notice the note was missing when he returned.

It was only a week later that a mission went horrible wrong. They had wound up on opposite sides of Magneto, who made a credible effort to rip Logan’s skeleton out of his body, and between the physical trauma and the aerosolized anti-mutagens the paramilitary organization they’d been infiltrating had been experimenting with, even Logan’s healing factor was struggling to recover. Morale was at an all-time low and everyone licked their wounds and guiltily avoided the infirmary, feeling genuinely bad for the feral mutant but also wary of setting off his temper, frayed by several days of constant pain. Scott spent as much time as he could spare with him, both as team leader and the one most hardened to Logan’s outbursts.

“Anything I can get you?” Scott asked.

“A fucking book maybe, Jesus Christ, I’m climbing the walls here- oh shut up,” Logan growled. Scott quickly hid his smile at Logan’s words- the man wouldn’t be climbing anything for at least a day and a half by Hank’s latest estimate.

“I’ll go grab your book,” Scott said, getting up, ignoring Logan’s calls to wait as he left.

It really wasn’t any trouble to go up to Logan’s room- somewhat surprisingly neat, as though he still expected to have to pack up his things and bug out at a second’s notice- and grab the paperback western on his nightstand.

He wasn’t sure what possessed him to open it- instinct, maybe- but it was bookmarked with a folded sheet of paper. His own handwriting stared up at him.

Scott walked back down to the infirmary- he had only intended to drop the book off and go back to work- but he sat back down at his bed side, setting the book in-between them. Logan looked non-plussed, but his eyes were wide and slightly panicked. They both knew that Scott had seen the bookmark.

“That note was intended for a specific person,” Scott said. “It meant something specific.”

“What did it mean?” Logan asked.

“The person it was for would understand,” Scott said. Logan wrinkled his nose, and looked away.

“Maybe it would do the person good to hear it.”

“It’s not the sort of thing you can put into words.”

“Oh bullshit,” Logan said, “That’s what writing is _for_ , dipshit, to freeze the shit that can’t be heard so you can see it clear.”

Oh, thought Scott. It was funny- ten years, and this was the one possibility he had never considered.

“I think you’d have to be pretty dumb to expect any different of me, after this long,” Scott said.

“I didn’t expect anything,” Logan said defensively.

“Why?” Scott asked.

“I just said-“

“Why did you start? You didn’t even like me?”

“I _felt_ for you,” Logan said. “You don’t have to _like_ someone to _feel_ for them.”

“Fair enough,” Scott murmured. He wished he could take off his glasses, press against his eyes. He tilted his head back instead.

“That’s it?” Logan asked.

What else was there? Scott wondered to himself. He had kept the notes for ten years. He had read them, thought about them, kept them safe. The drawing had been meant to be his answer- he wasn’t sure how he could possibly put his feelings into words.

He hesitated a moment, then reached out, laid his hand across Logan’s. The hair on the back of his hands rubbed against Scott’s palm, his flesh still hot to the touch from inflammation and slightly soft from recent healing. He ran his hand down, till just their fingertips touched, then back up past his wrist. Logan flipped his hand over as Scott ran his hand back down- curled his fingers up to catch Scott’s. Scott pressed down, pinning Logan’s hand to the bed as he stood, leaning down to press a dry kiss to the corner of Logan’s mouth. Logan turned his head, leaning up with a pained wince as Scott pulled back.

“That’s it?” he repeated, and Scott leaned down, quickly kissing him properly. Their foreheads pressed together, Scott’s blood hot and flushed in his face.

It was inadequate- it was all inadequate. There weren’t words- I feel for you, I feel you, I felt you? Scott wished, desperately, that Logan could read his mind, could see his heart, could just _know_ what was going on in this moment.

Logan lifted a hand up, effortful and clumsy.

“I gotcha, Slim,” Logan said, breath brushing against Scott’s skin. Scott kissed him again, capturing the words. He pulled back, letting go of the hand he had pinned to catch Logan’s other arm, gently guiding it back down to the bed, backing away as Logan’s breathing had taken on a pained cadence.

“Keep your chin up,” Scott said, squeezing his hand lightly. “There’s work to be done, and I need you by my side.” Logan snorted, nodding a little and closing his eyes.

“Understood,” he muttered. Scott hesitated, and picked Logan’s book up, flipping to the back. There was a pen on the bedside table, and he drew in the back- a tree, fully grown, strong- and shut the cover, placing it back on the bed. He wondered if Logan was looking at him, if he had noticed, but he gave no sign or indication that he had.

“That’s it,” Scott said to him, and left. There was nothing else- they already had each other, had nurtured feelings for over a third of Scott’s life. What else was left to grow? What else was left to do, but to love?

**Author's Note:**

> Logan’s handwriting is an inside joke that as a former 19th century schoolboy he probably learned beautiful script, hence the title, and I fully stand by this headcanon but I’m not sure if my intention came through in this fic I wrote in one go at midnight XD


End file.
